Nurturing Our Childlike Faith – Mark 1:21-39

Lectionary Readings for Jan. 31, 2021                 Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany, Year B
Deuteronomy 18:15-20     v15 Moses continued, “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him.”
Psalm 111         v2 How amazing are the deeds of the Lord! All who delight in him should ponder them.
1 Corinthians 8:1-13   v1b But while knowledge makes us feel important, it is love that strengthens the church.\
Mark 1:21-39             v22 The people were amazed at his teaching, for he taught with real authority

Peace Quotes

“A teacher affects eternity; they can never tell where their influence stops.”  ~ Henry Adams

“The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery.”  ~ Mark Van Doren

Today’s reading talks about Jesus being a great teacher, and His teachings have certainly affected eternity. We continue that legacy when we teach the value of seeking peace as we deal with conflict. May our lives help others discover the joy of peace within us and around us.

Any time I preach or lead a group, regardless of age, I start the same way. I’m going to say three short sentences. Please repeat each sentence, with enthusiasm.
God made me.           God loves me.            God has plans for me.

Preface to Today’s Scripture Reading

Last week, we heard the Gospel of Mark tell us the story of Jesus inviting two sets of brothers to join Him in ministry. Today’s reading picks up that story and tells us that Jesus did not waste any time; He took his new disciples to hear Him preach and watch Him perform one miracle after another (see photo of crowd) – two actions that drove home Mark’s point.

First, Jesus was a spiritual teacher with no equal; His messages conveyed an authority that was new and fresh to them. Neither His age nor his poverty-class background mattered when He spoke. One thing was clear: God’s Spirit was moving in and through Jesus in a way that caught everyone off-guard, captivated every ear who heard Him, and could not be denied once experienced.

As for the miraculous healings, who was healed and how they were healed doesn’t matter at all in today’s story. The critical point that Mark wants his readers then and now to understand is that Jesus is the ultimate healer. It’s one thing to be a great public speaker, but Jesus had complete, controlling power over the mysterious and terrifying forces that prevented people from being able to fully hear and experience the Good News of God’s love. In their culture, unclean spirits that caused convulsions and physical handicaps had no medical explanations, and death offered no joy.

Whatever Jesus said in his messages in the Jewish temple, He backed with undeniable demonstrations of His message put into action. Let this remind us that our actions of service should reflect our words of faith. As our faith grows deeper, we can expect our actions to grow bolder.

As you hear today’s message, think about what prevents you from fully hearing and experiencing the Good News of God’s love. What are the voices of doubt, fear, jealously, or uncertainty in your life that need to be called out and thrown out? What’s preventing you from knowing and believing that you are anything less than a precious child of the living God created in God’s loving image, designed to serve as God calls you?

Think about that as we open our ears, minds, and hearts to God’s Spirit as we read today’s Scripture.

Read Mark 1:21-39.

When I was a young child, my grandfather read me books and told me stories that were... not typical. Yes, we read all of the Charlie Brown classics, but by the age of 10, I was well-versed in the dangers of the Bermuda Triangle. Rather than read the Hardy Boys or King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, my grandfather read bizarre stories from a Reader’s Digest book titled Mysteries of the Unexplained. How can you deny the validity of eyewitness accounts?!? My grandfather had a particular interest in books and stories about miraculous healings and life-after-death experiences.

You can only imagine how all of this fueled my young, every-growing imagination of what is possible – even if it’s not explainable. In its own unique way, these incredible stories also shaped my faith. As much as I love the dependable repeatability of scientific experiments, these stories (with my grandfather’s help) increased my willingness and capacity to believe in what cannot be proven.

Jesus’ words and actions dramatically expanded people’s willingness and capacity to believe in what they had never-before heard or witnessed. In a culture missing anything we would call “modern medical science,” superstitions were part of the cultural fabric and personal experience was everything – seeing really is believing. Jesus understood this. He’s healings proved He was genuine and credible.

Verse 28 says “At once Jesus’ fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.” Well of course it did! What better marketing tool can you imagine than miraculous healings and the word-of-mouth that goes along with that? People then – as well as today – are anxious to tell people about miracles. In short order, Jesus converted entire communities from being skeptics to being evangelists. “Let me tell you what God has done for me and my family! Come, see for yourself!” When God’s loving, healing activity in the community was openly discussed, people were drawn in; they wanted to be closer to loving words and healing actions. We can learn a lot from that.

Later in the story, when Simon-Peter’s mother-in-law was sick, Simon-Peter told Jesus about her and invited His presence close to her presence. Simon-Peter did not solve the problem himself. That was neither his capability nor his responsibility. He introduced the solution to the problem and got out of the way. We can learn a lot from that also. I imagine the prayer-like conversation between them in that moment: “Hey Jesus, You’re awesome! Here’s the problem, and we can’t fix it. If you’ll heal her, she’ll be able to serve you, and we can proclaim praises for what You do. Balls in your court. Thanks in advance!”

Despite all the fame and attention these healings garnered, today’s story ends with Jesus doing two things: 1) praying by himself and 2) clarifying His purpose – His mission – to His new-found ministry team.

Being a product of my culture, I’m a “doing” oriented person. If I’m not “doing” something “productive” I feel like I’m wasting my time. But it’s hard to tell Jesus that He was wasting the time He spent praying. His prayer time kept Him grounded in His relationship with God and kept Him focused on what was most important. Unlike Jesus, I frequently must remind myself of the saying, “We’re human beings, not human doings.” Time spent on caring for our being is time well spent.

Today’s story presents us several challenging questions.

• First, listen: are we listening for God to speak to us in new ways and, perhaps, through unlikely people?

• Second, grow: are we open to letting God’s activity in our lives increase our childlike faith – our willingness and capacity to believe in the mysterious?

• Third, share: when we do experience God’s activity in our lives, are we willing to share that to encourage each other and attract others?

• Fourth, reconnect: as much as we believe we are called to put our faith into the actions of serving others, are we willing to disconnect from everything so that we can reconnect with God through intentional one-on-one time?

• Finally, clarify: are we willing to let the lure of God’s Spirit guide our lives rather than the lure of what our culture seeks from us?

That’s a lot to digest – for the disciples 2,000 years ago and for us today. But this is the cost, this is the commitment of striving to live into what it means to be “Disciples of Jesus.” Being a disciple is just that – being. It’s not a title we can simply give ourselves and walk away. Being a disciple means being in connection with God, with ourselves, and with each other. And here’s the great news – even little kids can do all of this, in their own ways, with their own capacities. As I said last week, God desires the willing, not the perfect.

Let me leave you with these images of kids playing (girl in water, boy in snow). They’re not being “productive,” at least not in an Industrial Revolution sense. But they are developing life skills: excitement and wonder. Admittedly, I was quickly drawn to these two images but not sure exactly why. So I asked God for some clarity. The conversation went something like this:

“What’s she doing?” She’s jumping in a puddle. “No kidding.” (God and I get sarcastic with each other; God speaks in ways I’ll understand.) “Don’t just analyze, step back and observe. She’s inserted herself into something that was stagnant and made it active, made it bigger than it was, and its impact was felt in a space bigger than herself. The question becomes, where do you see stagnation? Where can you jump in – even for a moment – and insert the energy of My love? How does this apply to your own faith? Where is it stagnant? Where would you like Me to jump in?” Oh God, that’s some good stuff right there!

“What’s he doing?” Now I’ve shifting my seeing and thinking. He’s letting nature’s energy (gravity) take him faster and higher than he could go by himself. It would be safer to sit still and just watch from inside a warm house, but he’s taking risks so that he can become more involved with what’s around him and learn from that interaction. And God replied, “Exactly, Jesus would have been safer if He had stuck to preaching in the synagogues, but that wasn’t where He was needed. Don’t let a few scrapes and bruises prevent you from following Me and immersing yourself in my creation.”

We can learn a lot from kids like these as we try to nurture our childlike faith. And like these kids, let us not hesitate to share our excitement about our experiences and discoveries with others. Excitement, wonder, joy, anticipation, hope, love... these are all infectious and worth spreading as we seek to expand the Kingdom of God.

Amen? Amen!